Saturday, January 31, 2015

January Stitch from Stash

Another thing that Shared Crosses is doing is a Stitch from Stash Challenge where you promise not to buy any new charts (with a few exceptions stated at the beginning).  You can however purchase fabric, floss and accessories needed for a project already in your stash.  The only thing I purchased was a package of light blue Aida to stitch a free Olaf chart for Kyleigh's birthday.  I also purchased a pillow form and fabric for it as well.

I'm sort of following the Stitch from Stash Challenge on Mel's blog http://epicstitching.blogspot.com/ because it was closed when I first found out about it.

So here's my report:
I started with $25.00

I spent $4.99 for the package of light blue Aida.

I completed this giraffe on the first so I'm not counting it even though I've had the magazine long enough.


I also started and finished two other projects in my stash, but one was purchased in August and the other was in a November magazine so neither have been around long enough to count.



I also stitched on one more project for almost two weeks, but it's a large project and I won't count that until it's finished.

So my ending carry forward balance for January is $25.00 - 4.99 = $20.01..


January Turtle Trot

I belong to a group called Shared Crosses, a Christian Cross Stitch group.  One of the things we've been doing is a modified Turtle Trot.  During the third week in January (17-23, posting on the 24th), we each pick a WIP that we want/need to finish in the foreseeable future and stitch exclusively on it.

However, I'm not very good at stitching something on a certain date so I didn't start until the 19th and didn't stop until today.  I probably would have kept at it, except I have a couple of projects for WOCs that are due at the end of the month.

My project is Tinkerbell Spring Blossoms by Stoney Creek for Disney.  Before I started stitching on the 19th:


This is only the bottom half of the picture.  The top half is completed.  Also, the fabric is a really pretty mint green, but it doesn't photograph well.  After, on the 31st:








Friday, January 30, 2015

Retired


As of 5:00 today, I am officially retired from my job at Chapman University in Orange, CA.  The cake is from the retirement party given me by my coworkers.  There were a lot of people in attendance and most of them were happy for me, but sad for themselves because I provided a major support function.  In fact, I've had several offers to come back on a temporary basis either in my office or another department on campus.

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

It's Girl Scout Cookie Time

Kyleigh is a Daisy Girl Scout this year and is selling Girl Scout Cookies for the first time and is doing very well. So far she's sold almost 100 boxes and it's only the first few days.


I took her to my office this afternoon with a cart full of cookies and she sold over half of what we took in. The price has gone up to $5.00 a box so the math was easy and she did really good figuring out how much the person owed and making change.

Saturday, January 24, 2015

Busy Day

Today was a busy day.

Immediately after breakfast, we went to pick up 84 boxes of Girl Scout cookies for Kyleigh to sell.

After we took them back to the condo, we decided to go look at some new houses. We did find a couple we liked, but at $895,000 and up, they were kind of out of Janice's price range. Kyleigh was amazed by the bathtubs and claimed that they were big enough to sleep in.



After this, we took her to a friend's birthday party at a local skating rink. Kyleigh had only been skating once before and still wasn't really comfortable on skates. By the end of the party though, she was letting go of the wall and seemed to have gotten the hang of it--now she wants to take lessons.


Devin's the one who took this picture and he also sent me a second one at the same time. I'm not sure when it was taken, but I don't think she needed the stool :).

Monday, January 19, 2015

Happy Dance - Post Office


This is the completed Post Office from the Mill Hill Christmas Village.

It is stitched on 14-count pewter Aida with two strands of floss for both the cross stitch and beads and is the third design in this collection.

I started it on January 2nd and completed on January 19th.


Monday, January 12, 2015

WIWO - 1/12/15

This week I continued working on the Post Office.


It's done up to the second level except for the beads which I'll add last.  I predict a happy dance in the near future.